...that in the efforts to counter my tendency to use intemperate language, to be family-friendly, to curb a certain harshness, I may not be making myself perfectly clear..
I feel that might have happened in my post "Noise and Signal." So...just to be perfectly clear, regarding the derailment of Amtrak train 501 near Dupont, Washington:
I think the proliferation of programs and procedures intended to "check-off" safety concerns were "office-centric," if you catch my drift, and unintentionally created an atmosphere that minimized the single most important component of safe train operations-- training and supervision of operating employees by operating officer.
I think that no railroad, host or tenant, should ever allow the "cherry run" (there goes the family friendly) of a passsenger service to leave its initial station without a road foreman of engines in the cab of the locomotive; without a road foreman or foremen assigned to that train from start to finish of the run.
In fact, I think you keep road foremen assigned to that service until they have ridden with every engineer operating a revenue train.
I hope I've been clear.
dms
I even sound sweeter, when I talk....
--Etta James
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